Comfort
by Subject37
Summary: Warning: some femmeslash... After Harry and Ron died in the War, Hermione can't get over her own past. During the night her past haunts her dreams, and she always cries on someones shoulder, but whose?
1. Who was this?

Drip... drop... drip... drop!

The small girl, a younger Hermione Granger, curled up into a ball under the table. She heard the blood of her older brother dripping down from his many wounds. There was nothing she could do about it, though. The rage of her father had come out, and it wasn't finished. No, now she had to endure the screams of her devastated mother being mercilessly raped.

She wanted to scream, but that would notify her father that she was still awake; and no, she did not want her father to know that she was still awake after her bed-time. _Stop it! Please, you re hurting her! Why can t you see that? Please, why have you done this to us?_ The young girl pleaded silently, she just wanted it to stop.

She couldn't take it, the blood was turning her normally straight and beautiful blonde hair red and tangled.

_Go_! A voice that sounded familiar, like her brother, urged her on.

She stopped thinking about consequence. Up the stairs, she ran, down the hall, and into her parents' room. "STOP!" she screamed. "Please Father, you're hurting her! What is wrong with you?"

The outburst broke his concentration. He stopped molesting his young wife s body, and turned on his daughter. "What are you doing up at this time of night?" he snarled. He didn't see the woman pulling out a Muggle handgun from under her pillow. The young child blanched at both of her parents.

"Answer me, now!" he raised his fist.

"Christopher Douglas Gaetz! If you dare touch her, I swear I will kill you!" her mother yelled. He looked at her, and the gun didn't seem to even faze him. He jumped at her.

Before anyone knew what was happening, there was loud _bang!_ and a dying man bleeding his life away on white, Egyptian cotton sheets.

The young mother took her remaining child by the hand, collected a bagful of clothes and left the house; it ranked of death.

Hermione Granger screamed before she realized that the memory was only a dream.


	2. Who was in Hermione's bed?

Her scream awoke the figure next to her. The person in her bed wrapped a petite arm around her. Hermione tensed. Ever since the death of Harry and Ron she had been having nightmares about her past. But who was it that had wrapped their arm around her?

Ginny? No, Ginny had stopped sleeping in the same bed with Hermione ever since Hermione had beaten her almost senseless when she had awoken from her dreams.

Ro-? No, he died when trying to defeat Voldemort and so did half the other Weasleys including Mrs Weasley, the plump woman who was a mother to more than her own children, Bill, the twins and of course Ron himself. And Harry.

Hermione burst into tears as she thought of Ron and Harry and how Ginny had stopped sleeping with her because of one night's memory lapse. She didn't even wonder whose shoulder she was crying on or whose hand was stroking her softly.

Luna's dreamy but concerned voice whispered incomprehensible things to Hermione. Her voice alone kept Hermione from bursting into hysterics again. It was so serene, so dreamy, and out of reality, and it was almost contagious. Hermione clung on to the blonde, pouring her heart out without a second thought. She had loved Ginny, but Ginny didn't return her feelings, but she had also comforted Hermione when she dreamt of the night Voldemort was killed. Neville was also killed, by the tortuous Bellatrix Lestrange. Before her untimely demise, Molly had killed Bellatrix. Luna frowned slightly as Hermione recounted that for he had meant a lot to her. Then Hermione went on to apologizing for bringing him up. then onto to her dream of her mother. And then she started to choke on her own words and sobs.

It was like this every night. A scream to wake Luna from her pleasant dreams of clouds or creatures she believed in. Her soothing the sobbing Hermione as she relayed her nightmare to her. Hermione had always loved how Luna could always have the serenity in her voice. To her, it seemed, Luna was always never quite there, as if some part of her conscious mind was elsewhere. She liked that, it always left her wondering where Luna's lost piece of consciousness was.

Luna quietly took everything each night, she was too illusive to tell Hermione her own feelings. Until one night the silver-eyed girl opened herself to Hermione.


	3. Who Cried?

Hermione was having trouble sleeping that night, and had given up trying altogether. Luna was dozing with her eyes half open.

Silver behind almost transparent gold. Hermione thought. She had never really registered just who was comforting her during the nights. So instead of sleeping, Hermione decided to study Luna. She never had time to because the only times she saw Luna was when she was crying and when Luna would crawl into her bed. Luna was beautiful. That's all she could think of when she studied her companion. With extremely light blonde, almost white, hair that ran down her back to be accidentally tucked into her pyjama bottoms. Her pale skin flowed nicely with her hair, and her eyes were silver, per usual but they were different to Hermione now. Hermione then studied her face, not too sharp angles which Hermione couldn't resist the urge to feel.

Luna's skin was soft and warm. The ridges her eyebrows made weren't too deep, her cheekbones were high and somewhat wide. Hermione found happiness in her fingers; never had she felt skin this soft and flawless. She leaned forward and layed a chaste kiss upon the pale woman's lips.

She fell asleep again. There was a scream as she heard her mother come across something too vile to speak of. "Run! Mione-baby, run for your life!" the soon-to-be dead mother ordered her daughter.

"But Momma, what about you?" the ever-persistent child asked.

"Just go!" and Hermione did what she was told quickly. About two hundred yards away she heard her mother scream again, and then a shrill cry of laughter.

"Momma?" Hermione said quietly. A chute of green light flew in the air, and then a symbol Hermione had never seen before floated in the air. It was a skull with a serpent twining through it's empty eye socket.

That was the worst night of Hermione Jean Granger's life, and it still haunted her in her dreams.

She woke up, aware that Luna was holding her tightly. She said nothing, her face remaining dry. But it was Luna who was crying this night. "Mother... please come to the beach... please..." she pleaded. Hermione felt her shoulder becoming wet by Luna's tears.

"Luna, shhhh," she said gently, cooing her like she would an infant. She ran her fingers through Luna's white-blonde hair.

"Hermione... I wish you wouldn't be so blind," Luna said with feather-light intensity.

Hermione was at a complete loss. "Blind to what?" she questioned, slightly shaking her head.

"M-My... my love to you." the blonde replied quietly with a subtle stutter.

Hermione didn't know what to say. She didn't need to say anything, though. Luna pulled away slightly and looked Hermione in the eye. "You sound so sad when you talk in your sleep. I just wish I could help you, that is why I sleep in your bed at night. Because at night is when you're weakest. So I will be you're strength at night." Hermione was almost in a state of shock. She was loved by someone in this world? And she loved this person back. But before she could mull what she had just learned, something soft was against her lips before being pulled away. Hermione looked at Luna without much shock at this. She had, of course, kissed her before she went to sleep. She kissed her again, this time was Luna's time for shock.

Hermione wasn't the same Hermione; she had changed a lot since the death of Harry, Ron and the others. She didn't just believe in all that was logical, she had stopped disbelieving in Luna's crazy animals. Hermione's relationship with Ginny came to a stand-still the night Hermione had her memory-lapse. That was three months before, and her relationship with Luna had grown. Hermione really had changed a lot since Harry, Ron and the other's deaths.


End file.
